


Mirror Me Back at You

by cassieoh



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 12 days of blasphemy, Aziraphale Has a Vulva (Good Omens), Aziraphale is strong no matter what corporation she's currently wearing, Aziraphale's Bookshop (Good Omens), Body Swap, Couch Sex, Crowley Has A Vulva (Good Omens), Crowley's not bitter about that at all, Elevator Sex, F/F, First Time, Ineffable Wives, Marriage Proposal, Oral Sex, Undressing, Vaginal Fingering, light blasphemy, neither of them are virgins and that's great, possibly inappropriate use of prayer to inform God of one's plans re: sex, walking in the park as foreplay bc why not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-14
Updated: 2019-12-19
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:34:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21788338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cassieoh/pseuds/cassieoh
Summary: From the Elevator to the Backroom, the first few hours of the rest of their lives. Ineffable Wives fills for the 12 Days of Blasphemy ChallengeHalo: Crowley steps into the elevator expecting some instrumental remake of the Sound of Music, she gets something entirely different.Eastern Star: Aziraphale has been looking to Crowley as her guiding light for so long, it's only natural to keep doing so in a more intimate setting.Prayer: There's something not quite right in the air of the bookshop. Also, Aziraphale has some words for God.Kneeling: Both Aziraphale and Crowley have some things to apologize for, Crowley finds her words, Aziraphale finds herself on her knees.Golden Rings: Crowley isn't a virgin, but she's never loved anyone like she loves Aziraphale and there are a few things she's always wanted to do (to ask) and never had the chance.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 65
Kudos: 269
Collections: 12 Days of Blasphemy





	1. A Hand Mirror, Handheld

The thing about Crowley was that she was a being of want--she knew that she’d been one of the very few angels tasked with hanging the stars, but she couldn’t remember it. All she remembered was the emptiness, the vast spaces between sparks of warmth, traveling between those sparks for so very long that by the time she reached them, by the time she touched them, they were too bright, too hot, too everything for her. 

But, oh how she’d wanted to touch them. She didn’t remember what it felt like to hang them in the sky, only what it felt like to lose them as she fell away, down, down, down, into the lake where the little scraps of starlight she’d managed to keep for herself were burned away to nothing and she was empty. 

And now? 

Oh, now she’s as far from that lake of fire as she’s ever going to get again because she’s in Heaven and she looks like her angel and there’s Gabriel and Sandalphon and Uriel and  _ they want to kill Aziraphale.  _ She’s never felt more full in all her memory. 

She’s near bursting with rage and hurt and fear. 

The way it fills her only reminds her of how much she wants to not feel that way ever again, of how much she wants that she cannot have. 

She’d very, very carefully not looked at Aziraphale’s body this morning. Not even allowed herself the lingering glances across gentle curves and broad shoulder and bow lips that she normally survived on. It was different, she told herself, when she looked at Aziraphale that way, through her own cursed eyes, and knew that Aziraphale could hide herself away if she wanted. 

(It doesn’t occur to her, even as she glares at Eric, that Aziraphale hasn’t hidden herself away for nearly a century, has in fact, started being rather bold in the way she rolls up the sleeves of her immaculately tailored dress shirt, or loosens her carefully demure bun in the evenings.) 

They light the fire, loose the flames of Hell upon Heaven, and Crowley smiles, sharp-toothed and as wicked as her angel’s cheeks can manage (which is rather more wicked than most might expect). 

Then, almost before she can blink, she’s walking away, resisting with everything she has left the urge to make rude gestures and manifest something loud and noxious on which to tear through the gates of Heaven. She does not do that, instead keeping her steps as even, as deliberate as Aziraphale. She’s had so many centuries to study the way these feet hit the ground, the way they roll through each step. She’d never been able to emulate it before (and she had tried in this body, three times in fact, and ended up falling flat on her face each time). But, now, oh, now it feels like Aziraphale’s hands are on her hips, guiding her through each rolling motion. 

She never wants to leave this body, never wants to stop feeling so, so... she doesn’t know the word for it, doesn’t have the capacity to define the feeling that’s wrapped around her ever since they shook hands and Crowley collapsed across the event horizon of Aziraphale. 

Eventually, somehow, she makes it to the elevator. She doesn’t remember much of the journey, only that with every step further away from the core of Heaven, further away from Her Love she feels more hollowed out, aching and wanting and broken in ways she had thought she was used to. 

She stands before the elevator and waits for it to arrive. When the little bell dings, the door slide open and there she is. Crowley’s body stands before her, disheveled in the way that one can only be after a stint in Hell but grinning like anything. 

“Aziraphale,” Aziraphale says, “See you made it alright.” 

“My dear,” Crowley says and relishes the shape of it on her tongue. She steps into the elevator and the door slides shut behind her. 

There’s a moment, a flicker of a second, before the elevator begins its descent and they crash together. It begins as an embrace, fear and longing and the certainty that they would never have this. And then, Crowley does what she’s never dared to do before. She leans back, reaches up, and kisses Aziraphale as hard as she can. 

Her angel is still for the time it takes an electron to fall between excitation levels before she’s stepping forwards, sweeping Crowley off her feet and pressing her against the mirrored wall. Crowley gasps into the kiss and then Aziraphale is pressing forward there too, her tongue sliding across Crowley’s and Crowley was wrong before. That wasn’t Heaven, Heaven wasn’t the place where poncy arseholes tried to kill the very best of them, it was here in this elevator with the taste of Aziraphale on her tongue and the breath being squeezed from her lungs by their combined weight against the wall. 

Aziraphale’s hands begin to wander, leaving trails of flaming destruction along Crowley’s flesh. She longs to open her eyes, longs to look into the endless mirrors around them and see her own body ravishing Aziraphale’s like this, but she can’t quite manage that level of coordination. 

Then, oh,  _ oh,  _ then Crowley can’t think because there are fingers dancing up her stockinged thigh, under the skirt Aziraphale loved so much, higher and higher and Aziraphale presses Crowley’s nails into her flesh, just hard enough to tear through the stockings. 

“Azira-” It’s swallowed away with another searing kiss as the fingers slip past under the edge of her underwear, pushing through hair Crowley hadn’t noticed existed before that moment and sliding across the skin at the front of her and, and- 

Crowley’s breath leaves her and doesn’t come back, her lungs aching for the void of the space between stars as Aziraphale’s fingers press, push, sink into her. She keens and immediately wishes she could take it back because it’s too much, too raw, too--

“Oh, my dear,” Aziraphale whispers and Crowley sees her own eyes alight with something Crowley’s never seen from the angel before. She does something terrifically clever with her hand suddenly Crowley needs to move, because she’s realized the fingers weren’t actually in her before and now, with a thumb pressed against her clit and the scrape of blunt nails through the golden hair she desperately wants to have a look at, well.... She rather thinks she might discorporate is she’s not permitted to move to press against Aziraphale, to draw her in and in and in and--

“Are you alright?” Aziraphale says and she sounds nearly as undone as Crowley. Then, at Crowley’s frantic and wordless nod, “Crowley, my- oh, Crowley, you feel so good.” And Crowley realizes she sounds more than _ undone _ , that she sounds the same sort of entirely, completely wrecked as Crowley is right now because she’s using Crowley’s voice and Crowley had heard herself sound like that so many times before. But, she’s always been alone, always been muffling the syllables of Aziraphale’s name into the hay or a pillow or her own fist all the while knowing that that was all she could ever have. 

The realization that she has this now, that she has Aziraphale, that they survived–oh fuck, they survived and the Earth survived and Crowley forces away the panic attack because this really feels rather good and she’d like to enjoy it now–sweeps over her and Crowley does the only thing she can do. 

She surges upward, whimpering a bit as the motion pulled Aziraphale’s hand away from her, and grabs at her own hair. She wishes she’d not been so eager to try out the side shave and that there was a bit more for her to grip (later, later, something in her whispers, feeling the weight of Aziraphale’s braid against her spine). She pulls Aziraphale in and looks up and sees it. 

There’s a halo around Aziraphale’s head, around Crowley’s body’s head and it- well, it’s not Aziraphale’s. Crowley knows Aziraphale’s halo intimately, she’s dreamed of it for eons, it’s pale and golden and so thin it looks like it might shatter were it not for the diamond strength that veins through it. This halo, it’s different, hollow but not in an empty way. It looks like the space between the event horizon and the core of a black hole, like the tension between a planet and its star. It looks like how Crowley feels around Aziraphale. 

She realizes its her own halo, manifested by Aziraphale and just as suddenly Crowley realizes she’d been wrong before, or rather, she’d been partially wrong. Because yes, she’d been moving away from Her Love, but not from hers, and the capitalization is everything. Crowley knows herself (and  _ knows _ herself, though that’s another thing altogether) and she’s aware of exactly what emotion elicits that look in her own eyes. She’s felt it every time she threw herself into a chair across from Aziraphale, complaining about this or that and already soothed, calmed, centered by her angel’s love. 

Because that’s what it is. 

Love. 

Aziraphale seems to realize she’s been having a moment. Her fingers are still, though she doesn’t withdraw them. She’s still holding Crowley up against the wall of the elevator and suddenly that’s the most unfair thing Crowley can think of. 

“How come you’re still strong?” she asks and knows she’s got the exact petulant tone Aziraphale employees to get snotty baristas to stop giving her lip about her name. 

“What?” Aziraphale asks. She’s looking at Crowley’s mouth and sounds more than a little distracted. 

“You’re still strong,” Crowley says, wriggling a bit to prove her point and immediately forgetting her point altogether because there is was, that was the spot she needed. 

“Why the-” Aziraphale starts to speak, but Crowley doesn’t care anymore. 

“Nope,” she pants, “N-Nevermind, just please, angel.” It’s nearly too much, Crowley’s fingers are slim and her nails are just long enough to be felt and Aziraphale won’t. Bloody. Move. 

Crowley grinds down again, desperate to find that same sensation. 

Aziraphale eyes her for a moment and then Crowley has the singularly odd sensation of seeing a distinctly angelic smile cross her own face. 

“Oh,” Aziraphale says, yellow eyes twinkling with mirth, “Is this what you wanted?” She twitches her fingers, just the very tips and it’s enough to rip a cry from Crowley’s throat. 

“Please,” she says before she’s realized she plans to say it, but she’s too overwrought by the anxiety of the last week, by the sensations currently rocketing through to fight the words, “Please, Aziraphale.” 

The smile curls wider, showing the very points of teeth that aren’t entirely human anymore. Aziraphale leans in, pressing all of Crowley’s weight to the elevator, crowding so close Crowley can only see her own back and Aziraphale’s face reflected forever, back and forth into eternity. She’s panting, pale and red all at once and the blue of her eyes is nearly gone, save for the slimmest sliver around the rim. Her mouth drops open, trying to find the air that still won’t return as Aziraphale’s lips brush her ear. 

“My love,” she whispers even as she presses in and up and curls her fingers and oh, right, there’s the air, just out of reach. 

“ _ Aziraph _ -”

The elevator shudders to a stop with a cheery ding. They stand frozen and momentarily unsure how to proceed. Then, Aziraphale takes a step back, carefully lowering Crowley to the floor and withdrawing her hand from Crowley’s skirt. Crowley aches, she’s not empty, she doesn’t think she can be, not with the way Aziraphale’s love is pressed down around them, but oh how she  _ wants.  _ Crowley has to fight back the wild urge to grab that hand and shove it right back in there because how dare the elevator do this? Six thousand years and it can’t wait thirty more seconds to arrive on Earth? 

She glares balefully at the buttons. 

“Well,” Aziraphale says and there is something in her voice that sends a shiver up Crowley’s spine. “Shall we go for a walk? I rather think a little sunshine might do us good. You’re looking awfully pale, my dear.” 

Crowley.... Crowley has no words. The angel has just nearly killed her, brought her to the brink of something she’d never thought she could have and then... and now she wants to go for a walk?!

She opens her mouth to say all that, but Aziraphale is holding out a hand and her eyebrows are slightly lifted and Crowley realizes that she does want to go on the walk. She wants to walk with Aziraphale and talk with her and probably laugh and maybe argue. 

And, later, after all that, she wants to lay Aziraphale down in the bookshop, surrounded by everything Crowley thought she lost, and she wants to devour her. 

Crowley takes Aziraphale’s hand. 


	2. Guiding Light

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which, Aziraphale embodies the very idea of "congrats, you played yourself".

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> <3

In the end their walk through the park is rather abruptly curtailed. It starts well enough; they find their usual bench and switch back into their own corporations. Aziraphale takes a moment to settle back into herself, wriggling back and forth in her seat and coming to three sudden realizations. The first is that having been so caught up in the euphoria of living, of tricking Hell itself, she’d given no thought at all to ripping her own hose in her burning need to be touching as much of Crowley as possible. The edges presses against the inside of her upper thighs every time she shifts, drawing her attention to Aziraphale’s second realization; she’s  _ sore _ \--deliciously, achingly, tender at the apex of her thighs and, when she closes her eyes and concentrates, higher, deeper. There’s a subtle  _ burn _ that she wants to sink into, to luxuriate in, for as long as she is able. It’s not until she catches the flash of Crowley’s glasses in the sun as her demon leans her head back, a sunflower turning to her namesake, that Aziraphale’s third realization sweeps over her--Crowley could have reversed any of that with a snap or a thought. She could have put Aziraphale’s corporation back to rights long before they switched back. 

She watches Crowley out of the corner of her eye, trying very hard not to appear as if she is watching. 

“Yes, angel?” Crowley drawls, rolling the words about her mouth and Aziraphale endures one more realization of a much more immediate and intimate nature when that wonderful burn ignites to a blaze. 

She manages to reel in her own reaction to these realizations, carefully writing it in the smallest possible font in the back pages of the manuscript in her heart. She smiles at Crowley as steadily as she can manage and stands, holding out her hand to help Crowley from her sprawl to an approximation of human spinal alignment. When Crowley is entirely vertical she stills, leans in to peer at Aziraphale’s face, then her smile softens. 

“Come on, angel,” she says, “You wanted a walk, yeah?” She does not let go of Aziraphale’s hand and instead pulls her towards the walking path. Aziraphale allows herself to go, content to be lead for the moment. After a few steps she catches Crowley glancing around, eyeing each human they pass with a narrow-eyed suspicion that makes Aziraphale’s heart  _ ache _ because Heaven had drug Crowley away from her and had done so in such a way that Crowley could see the blow that felled Aziraphale. Her hand twitches, tightening around Aziraphale’s and Aziraphale is suddenly blazingly furious that they had survived so much, stopped the apocalypse, and Crowley still feels so unsafe. 

She pulls her hand free of Crowley’s and, before Crowley can do more than tilt her head in question, steps close, wrapping her arm around Crowley’s elbow and tucking herself up against the sharp angles of her demon. Crowley’s rolling steps stutter, tilting even more unnaturally than normal, before she catches herself and they continue to make their way down the path. Aziraphale is delighted to discover that, with her pressed so close, Crowley relaxes a bit more with each step. She breathes deep, taking in the subtle tang of Hellfire that clings to her own form and the curious lack of scent left behind after one washes with Holy Water. 

She wants to make Crowley smell like her, she thinks. The idea causes a blush to bloom across her cheeks and she curses herself silently, frustrated because she had been so bold in the elevator and now the idea of leaning in, of smelling Crowley and finding herself there, is almost enough to undo her. 

She takes a step and the hose pull against her. She sucks in a breath at the sensation. She can feel Crowley’s eyes on her now, watching her with a confused look on her face. 

“Aziraphale?” she asks, low and soft and Aziraphale  _ adores  _ her. 

They’re about fifteen meters away from their usual bench now, and Crowley pulls away slightly, leaning past Aziraphale to point at the way two of the ducks are harassing a goose. The confused look has melted away in her amusement; Aziraphale can see the way her eyes sparkle behind the dark lenses, the press of her canines against upturned lips. And that’s when Aziraphale decides they need to not be in the park anymore. 

It’s not the pointing that’s the problem, nor even is the little huff of laughter that escapes Crowley when the swan turns and begins jabbing at the large of the two ducks. No, the problem is that Crowley is distracted and when she moves to settle back into the semi-embrace they had enjoyed before her hand brushes across the swell of Aziraphale’s right breast. 

“ _ Crowley. _ ” Suddenly, it’s like they never stepped from the elevator and Aziraphale is desperate to pick up where they left off. Why had she ever thought this damned walk was a good idea? She thinks she might have had noble thoughts to restraining herself until she could give Crowley mroe than a quick fuck against the wall of an elevator, but those thoughts have crumbled to nothing more than millennia old parchment. 

“Yes, angel?” Crowley asks. She sounds slightly distant, distracted, and Aziraphale realizes that she has no idea what she’s just done. 

“We’re going to the bookshop now,” Aziraphale says. 

“What? I thought you wanted-?”

“I was wrong,” Aziraphale half-snaps. Crowley’s expression is open and startled, her brows rising up above the edge of her glasses.

“You were-,” she cuts herself off and glances away, swallowing heavily. “Angel, you don’t need to do anything you don’t want to.” 

Aziraphale doesn’t think that’s what Crowley wanted to say. She knows that Crowley could tell how much she wanted this, knows that Crowley had thrown herself heart and soul into Aziraphale’s arms. What she doesn’t know is why Crowley’s muscles are suddenly stiff against her. 

She draws back. 

She glances around before asking, “Is anyone watching?” 

Crowley listed her free hand and touches her temple, eyes fluttering closed ( _ oh how Aziraphale wants to kiss her lids, to press her love into them that Crowley might see it written on the world even after they have unspooled from each other) _ . Crowley nods. 

Aziraphale snaps and they are back in the bookshop. She allows herself a moment to breath deep, to seek the scent of vanillins and benzenes and leather oil and dust that are inextricably linked with safety in her mind. It settles her into the sled-tracks of her plan. 

“I don’t understand,” Aziraphale says. “If you don’t mind me saying, you seemed rather, ah, enamored with out activities in the elevator.” As she speaks she pulls Crowley across the room, towards the little backroom. She’s always looked to Crowley to be her guide, it’s a realization she’s come to over the last few years, as she listened to Crowley teach Warlock right from wrong (and then corrected the lessons). Aziraphale second guesses herself, its sort of her core personality trait, but she never has to do that when Crowley is in agreement with her. It’s freeing, to start to take an action and look up to see Crowley by her side and know, with certainty that settles the nervous flutters at her core, that this is the right path. 

The light from the little lamp across the room shines off Crowley’s glasses and one final realization settles into Aziraphale’s heart, filling all the crevices she’s always tried so hard to keep pristine and empty. 

She can’t do the wrong thing because she has a star to light her path. 

They reach the tiny loveseat and Aziraphale gently guides Crowley to sit, the comfort of her new Truth filling her with light. 

As long as Crowley is comfortable then Aziraphale is right, and Aziraphale desperately wants to continue what they began. 

“Crowley,” she says slowly, “I would very much like to touch you again.” 

“You- you’re already touching me, angel,” Crowley responds, tilting her head towards where Aziraphale’s hands rest on her shoulders. Aziraphale nods. 

“Yes, dear,” she says, “But, I do think you know what I mean.” 

Crowley swallows. She reaches up and removes her sunglasses, throwing them aside with a clatter, they flash as they arc through the light that streams in through the high windows on the small room. 

“I need,” Crowley pauses, clearly gathering herself. Aziraphale waits. Crowley has waited for so long, it’s only right that Aziraphale give her these moments. “I need you to say it.” 

Aziraphale’s heart breaks and soars and rises to fill her throat and she unravels the edges of it to weave into words as she says, “I love you Crowley, more than I think you realize.” Her hands slide from Crowley’s shoulders to the sides of her neck. She can feel the demon’s heart racing under her fingers. 

Crowley croaks and then clears her throat and manages, “Aziraphale, you, I mean- You loving me  _ at all _ is more than I realized.” 

Aziraphale smiles down at her and leans in, “I should like to kiss you, my dear.” 

“Pleassse,” Crowley hisses and it’s the dawn star cresting the horizon. 

Aziraphale smiles and does. 

It’s a bit awkward at first, her lips aren’t used to this after all. It’s been so many years since she’s kissed anyone with passion and she’s never done it with love. So, for the first few seconds, it’s the dry press of lips to lips and nothing more. Then, Aziraphale’s eyes crack open and she sees the Crowley is staring at her, wide-eyed and frozen and, well,  _ it’s funny _ . The corner of her lips curl up into a laugh and when she opens her mouth to scold the demon for being so awkward about this, she finds that her words are stolen away because Crowley has suddenly come to life beneath her. The demon’s hands glide up her sides, higher, higher until they are tangled in Aziraphale’s hair, pulling at her braid and pressing her in so that Crowley might devour her. 

She feels the slick slide of Crowley’s tongue against her own, gathering up all the words and vows Aziraphale wants to make and taking them away. The pressure and sensations overwhelm her, rattling down her legs until her muscles can no longer support her and she collapses down onto Crowley’s lap. Crowley shifts, twists her own legs, releasing Aziraphale long enough to reach down and freeing Aziraphale’s skirt from between them. Then, Aziraphale is helpless because Crowley is kissing her again and has shifted her leg so that her slim thigh is pressed against the torn hose and damp knickers and Aziraphale can feel that wonderful soreness ignited once more by the pressure. One of her hands is still at Crowley’s throat, unable to stop delighting in the way Crowley’s heart has sped up, but the other scrapes up to dig into the short hair on the side of Crowley’s head, scratching at her scalp with blunt nails. 

Crowley keens into her mouth and Aziraphale swallows it, eager for more. She grinds down onto Crowley’s leg and the sensation is so overwhelming on top of what she’s been feeling ever since they switched back that she breaks away from the kiss, gasping for air. 

“Crowley,” she pants, shifting back and forth and Crowley grins up at her. “Oh!”

“Look at you,” Crowley says, her voice filled with awe. She grabs Aziraphale’s hips and helps her, canting her legs up so that the angle is sharper, closer to what Aziraphale needs. Aziraphale’s head falls back against her will--she doesn’t want to look away because Crowley’s face is open, her eyes wide with wonder and such an open look of adoration on her face that Aziraphale can barely stand to think that it might fade. But- Oh, she can’t stop herself because one of Crowley’s hands in still guiding her hips back and forth and the fabric of her knickers is catching against her and now Crowley’s other hand has slipped between them to press against the very front of her and the added pressure is just enough. 

Aziraphale shatters and shudders, ecstasy rippling through her in little shock waves that leave her feeling rattled and whole and empty and wanting  _ more _ . She opens her eyes and the emptiness is filled because Crowley is looking at her like she’s always dreamed of Crowley looking at her. 

“A kiss, huh?” Crowley croaks. 

Aziraphale leans in, enjoying the little aftershocks the motion sends spiraling through her gut. 

“Yes, my dear,” she says and presses a quick kiss to Crowley’s cheek.


	3. The Sea of Snakes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Day 3: Prayer

They sit in comfortable silence for a few moments, breathing in the commingled air, each reveling in something all their own and something shared in the spaces between them. Aziraphale, floating in a delighted haze of very human endorphins and very angelic bliss, is content to lean into Crowley, her arms looped over Crowley’s shoulders, her demon’s hands on her hips and face canted up to hers, eyes open and filled to the brim with everything Aziraphale has been trying not to see for the last six thousand years. She never wants to stop looking. 

For her part, Crowley is trapped in a spiral of thoughts she’s spent a great many years traversing, though a new layer has been added, a new voice arguing back, shouting down her better demons. 

_ Why would she ever love you?  _ The choir of serpents hiss. 

_ Because she knows me and she thinks I’m enough _ , the new voice says. 

_ Ah, so she’s wrong. _ They writhe over each other, their scales rasping, trying to drown out everything else.  _ She can’t know you and love you.  _

__ _ She’s an angel, she doesn’t lie.  _ The voice is sure and strong and loud, far louder than the slip of scales.  _ Not to me.  _

__ _ An angel!  _ And now the snakes are triumphant, this is their trump card, their ace in the hole, their one sure thing.  _ Even if she does love you, you don’t deserve it.  _

__ The new voice starts to say something back, but Crowley’s heart is suddenly very loud in her ears, because what if they’re right? No, there’s no ‘what if’ here--she knows they’re right. Aziraphale is looking at her, her smile so broad it crinkles the corners of her eyes and Crowley feels suddenly wretched. 

It’s just--she’s done so many terrible things over the long years. So many things she never wanted to do and she can maybe find forgiveness in her heart for those things, but, and Crowley shudders at the thought, there are many things that she did not hate doing, that she contrived on her own. 

How could--

“Crowley, my love?” Aziraphale says, her voice a blazing blade through the haze of self-recrimination that has arisen around Crowley. Crowley tries to find the words to respond, but the tremble in her lungs seems to have overtaken her throat and her tongue is plastered to the roof of her mouth. “Are you alright?” Aziraphale has leaned back now, adjusting her arms so she’s holding the sides of Crowley’s face, the smooth pads of her thumbs brushing heated cheeks. 

Crowley manages to twitch her head in a nod then, desperate to reassure her angel that she’s fine, she’s always fine and there’s really no reason why she shouldn’t be now. The phantom smell of smoke curls around them and Crowley can’t stomach the lie. 

She’s never lied to Aziraphale before, not directly. 

“No,” she says and it’s a benediction as much as it’s a revelation. “No, I’m not.” 

Aziraphale scoots closer, pressing Crowley back so her spine curves to the worn lines of the sofa. She’d been sat at the very edge of the seat and now she’s practically horizontal, Aziraphale sat atop her, hips straddling hers and leaned forward onto her knees so that she might crowd as close as she desires. 

“Oh, my dear,” she whispers, “I’m so terribly sorry. I should have asked before I-” She break off and gestures sheepishly to her own lower half. “That was terribly selfish of me, I’m afraid.” 

Crowley shakes her head, frantic to reassure her that Crowley would never protest Aziraphale acting on her needs. 

“You did ask- I asked, I mean,” Crowley fights the words as they tumble over each other. She pauses and breathes in deep, past the smell of smoke she knows is only in her mind. The oxygen reaches the snakes in her heart and they try to speak again, but she rushes forward before they can steal her courage. 

“I love you,” she says, “I thought I lost you and I love you and the last thing I said was that I wouldn’t-” she breaks off and swallows, “That I wouldn’t even think of you.” 

Aziraphale stares at her. 

After a few seconds Crowley speaks again, “I would have.” Unbidden, her hands slide up Aziraphale’s sides, reassuring herself that not only is her angel here, not only is she alive, but she’s also  _ here.  _ On Earth, in London, on top of Crowley. 

It’s dizzying. 

“I would have thought about you every day, every moment,” she whispers, “I would have thought about that silly little laugh you do when you think no one is around to hear and the smut novels I know you have hidden in that desk over there and way a blush stains your cheeks when I’ve said something kind you didn’t expect me to say.” 

She leans up and captures Aziraphale’s lips with her own, allowing herself only a brief indulgence before she continues, her lips just barely brushing Aziraphale’s with each movement, “I would have thought of you when I woke in the morning and the sun was shining and when I saw children playing in the street.” 

“I- I don’t like children really,” Aziraphale says, sounding more than a little dazed. 

Crowley laughs and steals another quick kiss. Her hands trail back, moving from her sides towards her spine and Aziraphale finds herself arching into the sensation. 

“No, I know that, angel,” she says. “I would have thought of you when I saw the little devils because I fell in love with you for the first time when you told me you’d risked Falling just to keep their million-odd great grandmother warm in the night.” 

“What?” Aziraphale’s eyes widen, shining bright in the dim light that surrounds them. “Crowley you can’t have-”

Crowley laughs. She slides her hands under the hem of Aziraphale’s powder-blue button down, cool against her flushed skin. She’s content to let her left stay relatively still, lightly running the very tips of her thumb and forefinger across miraculously smooth skin. But, the right wants more and Crowley wants to indulge herself. She allows it to find the divot at the base of Aziraphale’s spine and begins moving upward, achingly slowly, counting every beloved micrometer, memorizing the way Aziraphale’s generous curves filled her hands, the hills and valleys of her--topography that Crowley has always dreamed of mapping. She’s never been much of an adventurous spirit, but if permitted she could spend the rest of her life discovering the new world hidden under cream and robin’s egg. 

Aziraphale’s rib cage shudders under her touch when she reaches the base. 

“Crowley,” she whispers and Crowley remembers that she’d been saying something. She opens her eyes and meets Aziraphale’s. She smiles. Aziraphale has that wonderful little crease between her brows that Crowley adores so very much. 

“Whyever not?” She asks, “Why shouldn’t I have Fallen for the first among the Lord’s Host?” 

Aziraphale shudders again, squeezing her eyes shut and shaking her head, “No,” she says, “You  _ can’t  _ have!” 

Crowley’s hands still in their explorations, they itch to keep moving--there’s new lands to map, exciting new ridges and ranges to summit--but she forces them to pause. She can smell the smoke again. 

“Why not?” she asks and she can hear the snakes now, a hellish host shrieking  _ it’s you, she doesn’t want you to love her because then she might have to act on it, you disgust her you foul thing, you monster, you abomination, how could she love you when even God can’t manage it?  _ She speaks louder, desperate to drown them out once more, “I think you’ll find I did. I won’t apologize for it.” 

“No!” Aziraphale explodes into sudden motion, standing from Crowley’s lap and throwing herself backwards. She wrings her hands and stumbles a few steps away before turning back to where Crowley sits, frozen. 

Crowley thinks she can see the faintest tendrils of smoke gathering in the corners of the room. 

“No,” Aziraphale says once more, “I will never ask you to apologize for that.” She wraps her arms around her torso, trying to make herself small in a way Crowley has always despised, “I only mean, oh Crowley, it’s me who should be apologizing. I don’t understand how you can be so kind, so patient, when I’ve only ever acted like-” She pauses searching for the words, and then, upon having a rather upsetting revelation that she tucks away for a later date, “I’ve only ever acted like an angel towards you.” 

“Yes?” Crowley scoots backwards into a vaguely seated position, uncomfortable with being so vulnerable when all her instincts are screaming at her to grab Aziraphale and run. “You are an angel. How could you behave differently?” 

Aziraphale shakes her head, “Not like that, I mean that I’ve treated you the same way I hated to be treated by Heaven. I’ve not listened or I’ve ignored or I’ve made excuses for so long.” She pauses in her nervous pacing to look back at Crowley. 

“I’ve been afraid of Heaven for so long,” she confesses, “and I’ve just realized that I’ve given you every reason to be afraid of me and I don’t think I can stand the idea of- of you having loved someone so unworthy of it for so long.” 

Unworthy? The word rings through Crowley and suddenly the path forward is clear to her. 

“You think you’re unworthy?” she asks, trying to keep the nebulous thought from escaping while she captures the others she needs.

Aziraphale nods miserably, “It wasn’t you who needed forgi-”

“Shut up, angel,” Crowley says, surging to her feet. She crosses the space between them and the snakes are a hurricane, the force of their vitriol pressed against her eardrums. “Don’t you understand?” 

She captures Aziraphale’s hands and gaze in her own. “You don’t think you’re worthy of my love and there’s an entire ocean’s worth of whispers telling me I’m nothing and you could never love me. But, I do love you and I know you’re worthy of it and, if you weren’t lying before then you-”

“I love you, too,” Aziraphale whispers, understanding dawning. “It’s not us,” she says, then, louder, “Oh, those bastards!” 

And Crowley laughs, because just like that the snakes have drowned in Holy Water and she thinks Aziraphale’s worries have just burnt up and there’s no smoke in the air or her eyes. They’re alone, truly and properly alone, perhaps for the first time in their shared existence. 

“You clever demon,” Aziraphale whispers. She pulls their clasped hands to her mouth and presses a kiss to the inside of Crowley’s right wrist. The sensation lingers, a firebrand and a glacier and a touch of the Holy she’s been missing for so long. Crowley can barely stop herself from falling to the floor in worship. 

She manages to sketch a smile, though her mouth rather wants to be engaged in something quite different. 

Aziraphale returns the gesture, looking up under her lashes and speaking without moving away from Crowley’s wrist. “Do you know” she asks, her voice low, dragging across each vowel, tripping at the consonants in the uneven rhythm to which Crowley has synchronized her heart, “just how  _ long _ I’ve wanted to say what I’m about to say?” 

“How can I know that without knowing what you’re about to say?” Crowley asks, feeling oddly distant, buoyed by the joy of their newfound freedom even as she’s pulled in by the whirlpool in Aziraphale’s eyes. She feels her angel’s lips curl into a smile against her wrist and then another short kiss. 

“Quite right,” she says. She pauses and swallows, glancing down for a fraction of a second before looking up and ensuring that Crowley is looking at her. She repositions her hands so they are clasped on either side of Crowley’s. A mockery of  _ orans.  _

“Angel?” Crowley asks. 

“Dear Lord,” Aziraphale says and it’s a prayer, an honest to God prayer meant for the Big Lady Herself. Crowley’s frozen in place, “Kindly bugger off for the next day or so. I’m taking a long weekend.” 

“Aziraphale,” Crowley says (and she’ll never admit it, but it’s a bit of a prayer of her own). 

“Oh, Good and Short-sighted Lord,” Aziraphale goes on, “I’m going to worship every inch of one You cast out and I’m going to rather enjoy doing it.” 

A laugh tears its way from Crowley’s throat because this is- it’s blasphemy on par with anything that Crowley’s ever done. Aziraphale grins at her, teeth white and bared in a challenge Crowley intends to accept as soon as--

“That’s all, Lord,” Aziraphale says, “In Jesus’ name I pray,” and Crowley joins her as she says, “Amen.” 

There’s a long moment of silence after that as they stare at each other, tension singing between them before Crowley can stand it no longer. A chuckle and then a snicker and then a full throat laugh escapes and before either of them realize it, they’re collapsed against each other, laughing and crying and holding on for dear life because  _ they’ve done it.  _

They’re really and truly free and, Crowley realizes with delight, there’s nothing stopping her from taking her angel in her arms and snogging her silly. 


	4. Stars in a Shaking Hand

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 4: Kneeling

Eventually, they manage to pull themselves together, gathering the delicate threads of their nerves back from the chaotic tangle they’d worked themselves into over the last week. Almost without thought or intent, they’ve moved back to the little sofa and Crowley has thrown herself back, pulling Aziraphale down with her until the angel collapsed with a huff of air against her chest. Still a little shell-shocked by how bold, how very beautifully, blatantly, brazen, Aziraphale had been in her prayer, Crowley can’t help but laugh again, though this is not the uncontrolled laughter of before. Instead, it’s quiet and gentle, the laugh that says,  _ yeah, were here and we’re together and I kind of can’t believe it’s really true.  _

Aziraphale sits rigid for nearly three seconds, half on top of Crowley, half on the sofa before her eyes widen and she finally,  _ finally  _ relaxes. She rests her head against Crowley’s chest, pressing her ear flush to her breast and holding her own breath so she might hear-

“It’s yours,” Crowley whispers into the dusty quiet of the shop. 

Aziraphale feels the slightest tremor run through Crowley as she says those words and it grieves her, because she knows that anxiety, that fear is of her own making. She has turned away from Crowley, time and time again placing Crowley’s physical safety over her emotional needs. Aziraphale had thought she was right to do so, still thinks that in many ways she might have been. Crowley isn’t slow, she isn’t measured, she’s always been one to leap over the edge of something new, seeking out reasons and answers and only think to wonder if she might have tied a safety rope or let someone know she was going. 

Crowley has never had someone following after her. 

“I’m sorry,” Aziraphale answers, “Crowley I’m so sorry. I was cruel to you, I said such horrible things. I- I know that those feelings of unworthiness weren’t not my own, but I can’t help but wonder if they were right after all and I-”

Crowley reaches up and cups the side of Aziraphale’s face, tilting it up and capturing her gaze. She’s smiling and Aziraphale is powerless to stop herself from returning the gesture. 

“Angel,” Crowley says and her smile never wavers, “Yes, you said things that hurt me, a lot of those things as a matter of fact.” Aziraphale’s own useless heart stutters in her chest, she opens her mouth to release the flood of apologies that want to escape, but Crowley is not done. “And I said thoughtless things to you. For one, I never should have said you were stupid.” 

Aziraphale blinks. 

“When did you-?”

Oh. 

The second time Crowley came to her, eyes wide in an emotion Aziraphale hadn’t wanted to identify but that she now knows as the all-consuming panic it was. She’d seen that same expression at the airfield, when the Devil himself reached into the core of Crowley and yanked her to the soil, wrenching her hard won Free Will away from her as surely as God had once torn away her Grace. 

“Crowley,” she whispers, barely able to force any air through her constricted throat. 

Crowley shakes her head and her smile has not changed even a micron. 

“No, don’t apologise,” she says, “I get it now.” She sighs and looks up at the dark ceiling above them. There are stars painted there, the product of a rather manic Crowley in 1983 with more time than sense on her hands. They’re a little clumsy, with points that trail off unevenly and wobbled edges (Crowley had kept complaining about the brush not cooperating, not pulling on the aether the way it should to paint stars into existence) but Aziraphale loved them and wouldn’t hear of painting over them. 

“Heaven isn’t like it was before,” Crowley whispers, “It’s-” She pauses and looks around the room, the smile still firmly in place, “It’s cold. Do you remember? It was warm before.” 

Aziraphale isn’t sure what this has to do with anything at all, especially Crowley allowing her to apologise. 

“Yes,” she says slowly, “I’ve always rather thought it was Samael who made it warm and when he Fell, became Lucifer, well...” 

Crowley hums, “Maybe,” she says. “That’s the the important bit though. What's important is that they wanted to kill you on nothing more than doing what you thought was right. I can’t imagine what it must’ve been like for you all these years, knowing they could look in on you anytime and I might be there for them to see.” Then, she pauses and the smile turns a little bitter, a little sharp and painful in the way it slashes across her face. “Or, well, I don’t need to imagine that. But, I didn’t know it was that way for you too and I should have.” 

She drags her eyes back to Aziraphale who abruptly realizes she hasn’t taken a breath in a rather long while. 

“So, you weren’t being stupid, you were trying to do the same thing I was only braver, better because you wanted to stick around and see it through and I wanted to run-”

“You wanted to save us,” Aziraphale says, “That’s not cowardice or wrong or whatever it is you’re thinking just now.” 

Crowley looks at her, the hand still cupping her face is suddenly blazingly hot, drawing Aziraphale’s attention away from the yellow-orange glow of her eyes. Crowley’s thumb is moving in gentle circles over her cheekbone. 

“You did save us,” Aziraphale says, “You saved yourself when I was too blind to see we needed saving at all.” 

Crowley barks out a laugh, loud in the close silence of the shop, “Aziraphale you possessed a human! Do you know that’s meant to be impossible for angels? I have to say, it was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever done not to grab you and ravish you right there on that driveway when you turned around and you were really there, really-”

She’s going to say ‘alive’, Aziraphale thinks, but she doesn’t want the conversation to go down that path. There is time enough for them to realize just how close to death they both came. So, instead of letting Crowley finish, Aziraphale reaches upward and presses a gentle kiss to Crowley’s lips, savoring the fact that she can do that now. 

“Later,” she whispers. Then, louder, “I had something I rather wanted to do to you then as well, though I think it might have scandalized more than a few of our compatriots.” 

Crowley, her shoulders looser than they had been before the kiss and her gaze hooded, smirks at her, “Oh? And what terribly unholy thing did you want to do to a poor demon?” 

There it is. Aziraphale loves her for that, for the ability to always maneuver them back onto safe ground, no matter how their circumstances might have changed. 

“Can I show you?” she asks. 

Crowley’s eyes widen, a flash of surprise before she nods, eyes burning into Aziraphale’s own. 

“Thank you,” Aziraphale says. She shifts so both her hands are free and captures Crowley’s lips once more in her own, content for a moment to lose herself in the sensation. She’s kissed people before, Queen Christina in particular had been a wonderful woman with whom Aziraphale had enjoyed quite the sordid romance until those awful suitors got involved. But, she’s also known from the moment she realized that the knotted roots of emotions in her chest for Crowley were love and fondness and passion and friendship that she will never be content with another. Kissing others had been good fun and she feels she’d been rather good at it, but the way Crowley melts beneath her is electrifying. She presses forward, tilting Crowley’s head back until it hit the sofa and then just a bit further still, delighting in the way the pressure feels as if they are melding into one another. Crowley makes such lovely noises, she thinks as she tastes an ecstatic whimper. 

The demon is so very undone already and Aziraphale hasn’t yet begun. 

She pulls back slightly, just far enough to look at Crowley and to smile, because Crowley looks halfway to ravaged and Aziraphale has dreamed of seeing that look on her for so very long. Her hair, already artfully mussed by their previous activities sticks up wildly in the back even as her wide eyes dart between Aziraphale’s own and her lips. 

Aziraphale smiles at her, as sweet as she can manage, and then she grips the zipper of Crowley’s trousers and pulls. As she goes she wraps her other hand around the slim curve of Crowley’s hip, gripping tight. 

“Unh,” Crowley grunts, her hips thrusting upward, desperately seeking Aziraphale’s touch. 

When the zipper is down, Aziraphale slides her hand into Crowley’s pants towards her other hip, twitching her thumb to free the button as she goes. 

“Assiraphale,” Crowley pants, losing control over her sibilants even as her eyes flutter shut and her hips buck once more. 

“Yes, dear?” Aziraphale asks almost absently. She hooks her fingers into the belt loops of Crowley’s jeans and stands back from the couch, peeling them from the demon as she goes. 

“Angel, please,” Crowley begs. She kicks her feet free of her shoes and jeans, “ _ Please _ .” 

“Please what?” Aziraphale asks, leaning forward once more and sliding her legs up Crowley’s legs as she goes. They’re smooth and well muscled and her knees are knobbily in a way that Aziraphale can’t help but find charming. She pauses in her ascent to kiss the top of each knee, eliciting another whimper from the demon. 

Aziraphale is half leaned over now, crouching awkwardly between the couch and the floor, but she wants to see Crowley’s face when she realizes what’s happening. So, she pauses a moment, relishing the bumps and curves of Crowley’s legs, letting her finger explore ever higher, until finally, Crowley’s breath catches and her knees fall open, a clear invitation. Aziraphale smiles. 

“Perfect, darling,” she says and she falls to her knees before the demon. Crowley’s expression is everything she could have wanted and more; mouth slightly ajar, still unable to believe this is happening after so many years, lips kiss-bitten and red, hair askew, partially sticking up and partially plastered down. She’s a vision that Aziraphale drinks in, greedy in her need to remember every moment of this night. 

“Angel,” Crowley croaks. Aziraphale leans down and presses one final kiss to the inside of Crowley’s left knee before reaching out and gripping her hips once more. She pulls, scooting the demon to the edge of the sofa even as she moves closer. Then, she slides her fingers beneath the edge Crowley’s knickers (red silk, because the demon does so love her stereotypes), unable to contain her own quiet groan as she feels the burning heat beneath the smooth fabric.

She drops a kiss to the front of the underwear and, resting her chin there, looks up at Crowley. 

“Is this alright, my love?” she asks. Crowley makes an inarticulate noise and stares. “I need words, dear. I’m perfectly happy to continue as we were if this is too much. It is rather fa-”

“No,” Crowley snaps out. “Angel if you don’t keep going right now, I- I swear to anyone you want me to swear to, I will hunt down every last copy of Hamlet and burn them in front of you.” 

Aziraphale laughs. “Oh _dear_ ,” she says, “I suppose I’ll have to continue on.” 

She pulls the knickers down, relishing in the way Crowley resists closing her legs even long enough to remove the final obstruction between them. Then, unable to wait any longer, she darts forward, leaving kisses along the inside of Crowley’s left thigh until she reaches her apex. 

She pauses there, just a moment, to breath and to delight in the fact that they have made it here together. Then, Crowley’s hips twitch and the demon keens, desperate for contact, and Aziraphale can resist no longer. 

“Greedy, greedy,” she says and then her tongue is rather too busy to speak.


	5. Taking the Next Steppe

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 5: Golden Rings

It’s not that Crowley has never had sex before, far from it in fact. Save food, she’s always enjoyed the finer things in life and sex is no exception. She’d had a number of rather passionate encounters with various humans over the years and enjoyed the vast majority of them immensely. She still sometimes thinks about that delicious little thing Temüjin had so loved to do with his pinky finger and how she’d laughed with Börte about how proud he was of it. She missed those days sometimes, the early ones of his reign when Börte was his only wife and Crowley was free to find either of them at night. They’d been so in love, she thinks, so young and so in love and so scared of each other. That was why she was even there, Hell wanted the Great Khan to have heirs but Temüjin had been so stricken by Börte’s beauty that he could barely speak around her. So, Crowley had gone and she’d helped him rescue Börte when she was taken and she’d taught him tricks and she’d done the same for Börte and when they came together she’d been a little sad to think of losing either of them because they were both wonderful and human in their own way and Crowley was awfully lonely a lot of the time. Then, Börte had exchanged a look with Temüjin and, taking his hand in hers, asks if Crowley wanted to join them. Crowley had wanted that and so she had followed them into the _ger_ and stayed for the next decade. 

It was wonderful and one of her most precious memories. 

For a long time, she’d thought she would never have anything like it again, and she hadn’t even considered the idea that there might one day be something better out there for her. 

Because the thing is that Crowley only wants one thing, sure she’d enjoyed her flings and encounters, but there’s only one person she wants to stay with and she’d never thought she could have that person. 

Aziraphale groans and the vibration travels through her tongue, oh that wicked, sinful, perfect tongue and Crowley can’t help but writhe on the sofa. Aziraphale’s hands are gripping her thighs just tight enough to ache but not so tight that it’s crossed over into pain and Crowley hears Börte’s husky voice in her ears. 

“You’re so sad,” she’d whispered, her fingertips dancing through Crowley’s hair as she worked fragrant oils into her scalp. “Why?” 

“Aziraphale,” Crowley hadn’t said then, but cries out now. Aziraphale’s tongue delves and retreats but doesn’t leave her, instead shifting to focus on her clit, circling her in an endless orbit of pleasure so potent Crowley isn’t sure she can stand it. She was never meant to feel this happy, this perfectly at peace. 

Aziraphale hums and tilts her head so that she can swipe her tongue up the length of Crowley’s slit, pressing the upturned tip of her nose against her newly sensitive clit. Crowley’s hips stutter, twitch, attempt to buck upward, but Aziraphale’s grip is strong, holding her firmly to the sofa. Crowley groans and reaches down, groping blindly for Aziraphale’s head, desperate to control even a portion of what is happening just now. Her fingers find soft curls escaping Aziraphale’s braid and she holds on for dear life. 

“You love another?” Börte had asked on another day. They’re laying in the Khan’s bed, naked as the day they were born and wrapped in an extravagant pile of furs. Temüjin has had to step out for a moment to listen to the report of some general or another and so they press close, trying to preserve the warmth in the center of the space. 

And Crowley had been blissed out and chilled and Börte’s skin was soft against her own and for a moment she’d allowed herself to pretend that one day it might be Aziraphale’s generous thighs curled against her like that. A few brief seconds where she’d chosen to ignore the way things had to be and instead reached for the impossible things she wanted. 

“ _ Yes _ ,” she’d whispered then and cries out now as Aziraphale slides a finger through the slick that coats Crowley’s thighs, closer, closer until it reaches her core and, with barely a pause, presses in. Crowley’s fingers tighten, convulse, in Aziraphale’s hair and her angel’s smile is obvious against her flesh. She’s turned her head, now, so that her cheek rests against Crowley’s thigh and the warm air of her panted breaths brushes against Crowley’s heated flesh. She’s looking up at Crowley and her eyes are wide, pupils blown black and huge. 

She smiles and curls her finger and a sob punches its way free of Crowley’s chest. 

“You’re doing so well, darling,” Aziraphale whispers, sliding that blessed finger in and out, pausing only to briefly brush against Crowley’s aching clit, and she can’t take it anymore. 

Crowley looks at Aziraphale and sees her eyes, black with arousal, ringed in golden light. Hellfire golden circles around angelic blue--Crowley realizes she’s seeing her own halo for the second time that day and for the briefest of moments she feels a flicker of something like Grace and then she’s shattering, convulsing around Aziraphale’s finger and she continues to work her through it, movements slowing as Crowley shakes apart. 

When the tremors fade, Aziraphale drops a brushed kiss to Crowley’s damp skin before withdrawing her hand. Crowley whimpers because the sensation is almost too much and she wants more of it and she wants to kiss Aziraphale but feels too wrung out to move at all. More than any of that she’s really, genuinely happy and she’s not sure what to do with that feeling. 

“Angel,” she manages to say and Aziraphale seems to get it because she smiles at her and gently takes Crowley’s hips in her hands (and  _ oh  _ but Aziraphale’s hands are wet with Crowley’s lust and that’s doing  _ deeply sinful things  _ to Crowley’s gut, no matter how sated she feels just now). She helps Crowley to scoot back up onto the couch fully before rising from her knees and settling down beside her. She’s very carefully not looking at Crowley’s nakedness. There’s a blush high on Aziraphale’s cheeks and Crowley is so gone on her it’s honestly stupid. 

“All that,” Crowley gestures vaguely towards her own crotch and then Aziraphale’s mouth, “And you’re embarrassed about helping me sit back up.” 

“Yes,” Aziraphale says, glancing down to her hands before looking back at Crowley, “Well, that’s rather different isn’t it?” 

“Oh, right, different,” Crowley laughs, “Completely different! That was you eating me out and this is- This is nothing, you’ve helped me sit before, on this sofa even, when I’ve been too pissed to manage it myself!” 

The situation is ridiculous, Crowley thinks fondly, ridiculous and so perfectly Aziraphale. 

“Quite,” Aziraphale says, “Save one thing,” she glances around before finally meeting Crowley’s gaze again. 

“And what’s that?” Crowley asks, her mouth suddenly dry. 

“Well,” Aziraphale swallows, clearly a tad nervous herself, “It’s not the most romantic thing in the world, but I’ve just realized I could do it and I’ve wanted to for so very long and, well, what I mean to say is-”

“Marry me?” It bursts from Crowley before she can stop it. Her entire body aches, the delicious wonderful ache of Aziraphale ravishing her and the deeper, worse hurts of everything she’s endured in the last week and she thinks she might fall to nothing more than bones if she doesn’t ask what she’s been wanting to ask for the last six odd millennia. 

“What?” Aziraphale is clearly startled and hesitates just long enough for a bolt of fear to shoot through Crowley before she laughs and leans forward. She kisses Crowley, long and hard and  _ oh somebody  _ Crowley can taste herself. She might ache but she’s already feeling quite ready for round two, she’s had so many plans for so long. Aziraphale pulls back and reaches into the flat pocket at the front of her skirt, withdrawing a shining, golden ring, presenting it to Crowley.

Crowley stares at it and then at Aziraphale who is smiling softly at her. 

“Dear, you stole my thunder just then by interrupting, but I think it’s safe to say my answer is yes.” 

Something dangerous is rising in Crowley’s throat. 

“That was in your pocket,” she whispers. 

Aziraphale’s smile slips, ever so slightly. 

“Yes?” she says, “Crowley, darling, are you alright?” 

Crowley shakes her head, “That was in your pocket and we’d switched bodies,” she says, “I took that with me to Heaven.” 

Aziraphale takes her right hand and slips the ring on her third finger. It fits perfectly and Crowley can’t help but stare at it. It’s warm, from Aziraphale’s hand or her pocket or something else and Crowley’s never seen anything more beautiful aside from the perfect, terrible being before her. 

“You absolute demon,” she chokes out and then she kisses Aziraphale before the indignant words can escape her. 

Centuries ago, Crowley had kissed Börte and Temüjin goodbye for the last time on a windswept steppe, called away by Hell on another assignment. She’d been heartbroken, though she wouldn't have admitted it, and sure that she would never have anything half as good again. 

Now, holding her angel close and a ring on her finger, she silently tells her friends that they’d been right–She was going to be happy and she thought she maybe even deserved it. 


End file.
